My graduation speech!

vonderjohn, First of all, you're putting too much pressure on yourself. Relax. Let me explain: Last year, my dearest and best friend of 44 years passed away, and his family asked me to give the eulogy. I've never given a eulogy in my life, although I've heard plenty during my 67 years of life on this planet. This is what I did: I drafted the eulogy as soon as I learned they wanted me to give it. It was based on how we met in Chicago, and all the subsequent years that found both of us settled in California, and how we shared family get-togethers for holidays, weddings, and funerals. I redid the draft several times, then let my wife read it. She made one recommendation that made sense to me, so I removed it. My eulogy for George wasn't all that long, but it came from the heart. I read all three pages, because I knew that if I panic, words would escape me. At the reception after the funeral, several people commented that I did good. I'm sure you'll also do a good job. There are many rules for speech writing, but the most important one is "be yourself." c.i.

You are the valedictorian, good in English, and you use a phrase like "very unique"??? Oh dear.

"Vale" is Latin for "farewell," "dictorian" indicates "speaker." Does it help to know that you will be bidding farewell to your classmates as you all move forward?

VonderJohn, I've made lots of speeches. The first thing you need to do is decide what you want to say. Find a theme that represents your message. Then prepare an outline that touches on the major and minor points you want to make.

Don't worry about the length. Just be sure that you say everything you want to say.

Don't write out word-for-word what you want to say, but put your notes and key phrases on index cards.

Practice alone out loud a lot. Then ask someone to listen to you. Don't ask a parent. He or she will tell you you're wonderful. Ask a friend.

BTW, don't try to be funny. It rarely works, and you will feel awkward.

Also, I don't think you're as good at English as you say you are. Your first sentence has mistakes. Be careful about your language usage.

Good luck.

1Start with a raunchy joke, what can they do to you now, expel you?

2 Then open to questions, and give really wacky answers ( use lots of phrases with "like" and "dude" . Use dude as all parts of speech . eg, make a question out of it by saying "dude?" or an exclamatorical statement like"dude!!".

3 Close by telling them you hit the Powerball lottery and were just waiting for the proper opportunity to announce it.


This will be a winner, I can feel it. Dont worry about these other people and their , like concern over good English . If I hear back that youve used a phrase like "the world is your oyster" or "The future lies ahead(Unless your, like goofin on the audience) Ill be reallly upset .

I know for a fact that farmerman doesn't get upset that easily, so use as many "like" as you like. c.i.

Thank you
First of all I thank everyone for the replies.
Well yes I AM "generally good" in English, but im neither an expert nor a teacher though, and one of the things that really helped me in being good is by learning from my mistakes. So please for all those who noticed mistakes in my first post please do point them out.
Does anyone know websites that have tips for giving a speech?
Thank you

Just go up there unprepared and imagine yourself naked.

Oh, wait, maybe imagine the audience naked? I could never get that straight.

Points one and two sound a lot like the speech I delivered, which brings me to my own nugget of advice: show up sober.

Naw, show up stink'n drunk. That way, you have an excuse for flopping it. c.i.

Re: My graduation speech!


Vonderjohn, You asked that we point out your mistakes. Okay. Here goes.

You don't do a speech. You give a speech. And before you give it, you must prepare it.

"Got no problem." I'm guessing that you were being informal and that you know that you should have said "I've got" or "I have no problem."

"but this is the first time I do a speech like that and it is a very unique occasion that I haven't been to before."

There are lots of mistakes here.

Tense. You will give the speech for the first time.

A comma is needed between like that and and.

Generally, although not always, the word unique does not take any kind of modifier. Something either is unique (one of a kind) or isn't.

You are finding yourself in a situation that is new to you. Not an occasion. And you haven't been to a situation, but in it.

I wish you every success with the speech.

patio dog-I n ever considered the issue of showing up sober. However I think that there is some excellent advice to follow on this point. So much so, that Ive decided to incorporate that as an important piece of advice for "givers" of speeches. Here goes

"Try to be sober when giving the speech for real. This piece of advice , appears obvious to the trained speech giver, however to the novice wishing to make a career of public presentations, it can be a career modifier if one were to deveop a reputation for insobriety . This is especially true for speeches delivered at community historical societies, Baptist or LAtter Day Saints gatherings, or other gatherings where sobriety would be considered an asset. On the other hand, political gatherings, hearings for highway right-of-ways, and scientific symposia (after all isnt a symposium based upon wine?). In these occasions a certain levity derived from being "**** faced" may accrue benefits to the speech maker.

Thanks for the advice, I can see a handbook in the works here

mail it in

(could you send me a copy when you're done, farmerman? i'm thinking about running for public office, and would like to know the ins and outs. also, it would be most helpful if you could tailor the advice to specific regions. i may find myself needing to know whether crystal meth or good old coke will set me up for a luncheon somewhere...)

Seriously, though, vonderjohn -- don't worry too much about what the speech is supposed to be. Talk about something you want to talk about. If they insist on reading your material before-hand, give them a dummy speech if need be. If you don't go for pomp and circumstance (hahahahaha!), don't; if you do, do. Nothing's more boring than sitting and listening to someone say something in which they have no faith and about which they carry no passion.

Hey guys, Vonderjohn asked for some help. I don't think you're offering anything useful for a valedictory speech.

If he decides to run for political office in the future, he can check back here.

Re: My graduation speech!


This is one of those passage of time, moving into the future bits; if you're at a loss, look for some sort of temporal theme -- how've you changed, how've people around you changed, what lies ahead, "we disparate people, who arrived on separate roads and who will depart again on separate roads, are gathered here in this moment to celebrate the passage of time" or some such crap.



Whatever you want and/or can get away with. Maybe you could burn up some time thanking parents, family, teachers: they like that sort of thing.



The note about using an outline instead of a written speech is good advice -- if you are composed enough in front of a large group of people to fill in the blanks. If you think you'll be given to stagefright, I would recommend typing the whole thing out. Use a large font and triple space so that you don't lose your place. If you are feeling good, you can always paraphrase, even ad lib. But if you freeze up, you will be able to fall back on just reading off the page, which is better than standing silently behind the podium.



That depends on who you are. Be honest; this doesn't mean revealing a lot about yourself, just making sure you don't put yourself in the position of saying a lot of things in front of a large group of people that you really do not mean. If you hate everybody in your class, do not try to say, "I love these people, my classmates!" They won't buy it, and the audience probably won't either.



You can probably ask a teacher or an administrator for clarification on this, though they may not have a good sense of how long speeches past have actually been. Time slows down during public speaking, for the speaker and for the audience. I would say two minutes is probably a good benchmark, maybe three or four. This may not sound like much time, but believe me, as someone with a bit of a theater background, I can tell you that 120 seconds can be an eternity.



Hope this helps. Honestly, I do hope it goes well for you, though I've gotta say that my salutatorian address mattered nothing to me as soon as it was delivered. Of course, I flubbed my closing joke...

Oh, last thing -- you need to determine who the speech is for. Is it for the parents or for the graduating class? I decided it was for the class, and wrote my (slightly off-color and irreverent) speech accordingly, and gave the censoring principal some "we've come so far" schlock speech so that I wouldn't get shut out.

wise words patiodog. i like your style, nothing but good sound advice and empathy with the condition of the speaker

Roberta-relax, are you a nun?

I'll pick one advise from patiodog, and expand on it. pd's quote: "Maybe you could burn up some time thanking parents, family, teachers: they like that sort of thing." This is excellent advise. I would only expand it to include names of the people. People love to hear their own names in speeches. c.i.

She's trying to be helpful, relax, are you a grouch? :-)